Keep up with what's happening in the Australian Real Estate Industry

Monthly Archives: September 2013

What is a landlord’s idea of a good tenant? Is it someone who regularly maintains the upkeep of the garden or is it someone who is conscious of not spilling wine on the new carpet? Surprisingly, it’s not only malicious tenants who can cause property damage to a landlord’s life investment. Research from Terri Scheer, Australia’s leading specialist landlord insurance provider, has seen a spike in property damage caused largely by accidents, and by good...

Residex believes there are at least 5,000+ suburbs in Australia that you should potentially consider when buying a house or a unit as an investment. That may sound daunting, but it is easy to narrow down the list by following a few simple rules. 1. Think about the long-term Magazines, newspapers and online articles or blogs about investment are a great place to start your research as they offer some useful tips and insights on...

When looking to buy an investment property that will bring in a good rental return, location – in particular, proximity to public transport and the local shopping strip – is key. As is buying something that offers a sensible layout and, if you’re intending to lease it immediately, won’t require large capital works to bring it up to scratch. But once you’ve taken possession, what – apart from ensuring the property has been properly cleaned...

Melbourne’s much-loved Albert Park may soon be ringed by apartment developments, after Pace Development Group’s purchase of a six-level St Kilda office building. The 181 Fitzroy Street office at the southern tip of the park was bought by the residential developer this week for $17.15million in a deal negotiated by CBRE’s Kiran Pillai and Mark Coster, and Jones Lang LaSalle’s James Kaufman and Steven Messina. Pace intends to redevelop the large glass and concrete building...

Auction lingo is confusing potential buyers and putting them at a disadvantage, according to one buyers’ agent. Patrick Bright of EPS Property Search says buyers need to recognise the terminology used by auctioneers to understand the auction’s progress. “Like many professions, real estate has its own language and terminology that is often intimidating and confusing to outsiders.” Bright says the terminology is designed to elicit a response from potential buyers, but if they read between...

The Australian property bubble is speculation that real estate prices in Australia may (currently) be overvalued. This may be a real estate bubble. The bubble has been driven mostly by housing within Australia becoming investment tools instead of necessities. This was driven by the powerful real estate lobby, who heavily lobbied Paul Keating, John Howard and multiple other Australian prime ministers. Some experts, including Treasury officials,[1] believe the Australian property market is a significant bubble. It is arguably the biggest property bubble in...

ALMOST out of nowhere, it seems, international regulators are not just talking about macroprudential controls over bank lending but introducing them. There is now mounting pressure on the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority to follow suit. Despite the host of new regulatory requirements imposing higher capital requirements, leverage ratios, tougher liquidity rules and the like since the global financial crisis, there is a significant push on for another layer of regulation. In New Zealand, Norway, Sweden,...

INVESTING in property is a no-brainer at the moment. Prices have bottomed, auction clearance rates are on fire, especially in Sydney, and you can get a fixed rate mortgage for 4.8 per cent with 100 per cent gearing, 70 per cent in your super fund. And the experts are now saying there’ll be another housing bubble. What could be better? There’s no sign of a housing bubble yet: values are only just back to where...

It seems the world is hitting the panic button that a property bubble is forming that if left to its own devices could wreak devastation on an already fragile global economy. In Australia the regulators are making headlines with warnings to the banks not to be lax with their lending requirements, along with comments in The Australian Financial Review by former Reserve Bank board member Bob Gregory that a property bubble ”just seems to be inevitable”. It...

The Reserve Bank has cautioned against “unrealistic alarmism” about a possible property bubble in Australia, a day after it offered a muted warning to banks about prudent lending standards. RBA assistant governor Malcolm Edey has told a conference in Sydney that the central bank is keeping a close watch on house prices, which he said were growing at an above-average pace. However Mr Edey believes it is wrong to call the rise a bubble. “We...